Coinbase opens a bank account with Barclays and gets an e-money license from FCA

14 March 2018

Coinbase announced it has been granted a bank account in the United Kingdom through the partnership with Barclays, which will allow it to process transactions for the British users more conveniently and hassle-free.

This is the first notable relationship deal entered between a cryptocurrency exchange and a UK bank. Previously, most of the UK lenders showed way attitude towards the cryptocurrency startups, holding back from any business interaction with the industry players and digital coins at large on concerns about their misuse by criminals in illicit practices.

Separately, Coinbase also reported that the startup has been granted an e-money license by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and joined the Faster Payments Scheme (FPS), a UK banking initiative aimed at saving the time for the transaction processing between customer accounts at different banks.

Through the Faster Payments, Coinbase will be able to facilitate the entire process of managing the funds of its UK-based customers, who previously had to wait for several days before their payments or withdrawals complete, as the transactions were processed through the Estonian bank.

Zeeshan Feroz, UK CEO of Coinbase, noted that the UK customers will have a convenience of faster and safer transfers, and Coinbase will start from a pilot program to trial the new functionality with select institutional users. After several weeks the company will start rolling out Faster Payments to a general public across the United Kingdom.